


The Bakery Bandit

by bibliothekara



Series: Nightwatch'Verse [7]
Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: Angst, Episode Related, Friendship, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-17
Updated: 2011-01-17
Packaged: 2017-10-14 20:28:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,520
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/153153
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bibliothekara/pseuds/bibliothekara
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The rest of the team deals with JJ's departure in their own particular idiom; Penelope does as well, but with the aid of mysteriously appearing baked goods.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Bakery Bandit

**Author's Note:**

> Set after 6.02, "JJ".

**********

It had started with the black currant scones. Looking back, Penelope decided that initial clue should have tipped her off to The Bakery Bandit’s identity. But she felt she could claim legitimate and mitigating distraction.

Garcia knew she didn’t deal with change well. Some days, even “well” might be considered an overstatement, as Kevin could well attest. Exhibit A being the infamous Entertainment Center Incident. It really hadn’t been his fault that his timing coincided with a particularly rough case out in California. Entering their apartment, she had seen the living room furniture different. The TV, speakers and a few of the computers, all rearranged into a set of wooden cabinets. Kevin standing next to it all. His face had been so bright and cheerful, so ‘Look what I did for you.’

Penelope had promptly gone straight out again, not saying a word. Spending the rest of the evening at the coffee shop with her laptop, returning after Kevin had fallen asleep.

That one had take a few days to explain, and make up for.

Why didn’t you tell me?

Because JJ knew her way too well. JJ knew that she probably would have “done something”, with both of them regretting it in the end. JJ knew that abrupt change had rarely brought anything good to Penelope’s life. JJ was taking care of her team to the last possible minute.

(And even after. Garcia had smiled as she archived those first few emails from that shiny new DOD email address. Filled with news, and jokes, and questions. And since the holidays were coming, a request to “remind Reid as often as possible that he’s allergic to eggnog.”)

The team was managing pretty well; they were professionals after all. Professionals unfortunately too well acquainted with many kinds of loss.

Some things were pretty constant, even in the face of the storm. Hotch had stuck to his guns, thus far managing somehow to equally delegate the work JJ had once done among the members of the team. The man steadfastly resisted most laws of math and physics; how, she wasn’t quite sure.

Sometimes, even their lack of “managing” brought a smile to her face. Or, more specifically, David Rossi’s particular kind, which tended to be louder then the others. It had taken the senior profiler a few field cases to consistently realize that JJ was no longer there next to him. To head him off at the pass. Or politely tell him in code to shut his mouth, before he caused a diplomatic incident with the local LEOs. Hotch could usually fix things, but Dave was out the price of a few bottles of Glenlivet before he reacclimated.

(Penelope hoped the adaptation wasn’t totally permanent. Running the pool for Reid, Emily and Derek was too much fun to shut down for good.)

Those three had clung tightly to each other in the wake of JJ’s departure. Reid and Emily were doing their Geek Twin thing even more than usual. Sometimes, it was a good thing; sometimes it got awkward. Especially when they pushed Derek’s buttons, which they could do expertly by now. But most of the time, it was the Three Musketeers, plunging headlong into the next case, the next bit of chaos life and the FBI threw at them.

It was almost like a experimental proof of that medical....urban legend? Anecdote? Whatever it was. That when one of your senses is taken away, the others amplify in compensation.

JJ as the team’s eyes, or ears; their iron fist in a velvet glove. That sounded about right. Garcia hoped the DOD appreciated what they had, or someone there would...well, probably receive a very strongly worded email.

Not that understanding it  solved everything. Or stopped the almost-physical ache when they turned to say something, make a joke, an observation...and she wasn’t there.  But they took consolation in the work, and each other, the way they always did.

Which brought her back to the scones. And the muffin, and the gingersnaps, and the brownies with those special kind of black walnuts she liked. Left on her desk daily, on a Spongebob Squarepants paper plate. Each with a note in neat cursive describing the provenance of the baked goods and providing relevant phone numbers. She was initially tempted to take one of the scones down to forensics, but those other details had reassured her.

At first she thought it was Kevin, winning boyfriend points. A quick inquiry quashed that possibility.  After that,  she looked purely at the timing: the brownies had appeared on Friday before the team had been called to New Mexico, and nothing had appeared again until the following Wednesday, when they returned. It had to be one of them, but none of them were talking.

She was no criminal profiler, but Penelope Garcia swore that she would track down the person she had dubbed  “the Bakery Bandit.“

However, as it turned out, the Bandit eventually outed himself sooner than she thought.

Monday had been incredibly busy, and Garcia had decided to get in a little early that Tuesday, to get a handle on things. Opening the door, she almost jumped a foot. There was a tall man in a grey suit, leaning over her desk...next to a plate of what seemed (at first glance) to be chocolate chip-raisin cookies.

“Ah, Senor Bandito, I have caught you at last.”

The man straightened up immediately, but didn’t turn around.

“You’re early, Garcia.”

“Oh, sir, do you really want to get into that argument?”

“Not particularly, no.”

The man turned around, and Garcia immediately saw the pensive look on his face.

“Hotch...Spongebob? Really?”

Her boss’s guilty countenance eased a little.

“I had to buy some for Jack’s school; they’re cheaper in bulk, you know. We’re still using them up.”

“You have very good taste in baked goods, sir.”

“Actually, not so much. But I’ve had the good fortune to work with a lot of people with sweet tooths.”

Here, they came to an awkward fork in the conversation: say the thing, on both of their minds, that neither of them really wanted to say.  Garcia took a deep breath, and plunged forward.

“Not that they weren’t tasty, but...”

Hotch obviously understood the unspoken question at the end of that sentence. He looked down again, and then spoke.

“Because...it’s cookies,  and not cake?”

Garcia immediately wrote down Spencer Reid’s name on a list of people who had a lot of explaining to do. But she didn’t say anything, as Hotch went on.

“Because the last few months have been tough on all of us. Because I’ve asked a lot of all of you. Because I know you and JJ were, are very close. And because this is what I can do.”

He had put unusual emphasis on that “can”, and Garcia’s Spidey-sense pinged. She stepped forward, next to the cookies. Looking down at them, she looked up again into his eyes.

“What the...oh, for Pete’s sake, you don’t think I blame you?”

Hotch opened his mouth to object, but Garcia barreled on.

“Hotch, of all the people I’d like to blame for this, you are nowhere near the list. You are about 5 miles due east of the list. Please tell me you get that.”

Again, he looked like he wanted to say more, but thought better of it.

“She told me you’d do this, you know. Blame yourself, overcompensate, the whole nine yards.”

Hotch raised an eyebrow.

“JJ?”

“Of course. And she’s given me very specific instructions to take all possible countermeasures.”

Hotch started to smile.

“I’ve never really run this place, have I? You all just let me think I do.”

“Of course.”

He looked down at his feet, somewhere in between smiling and frowning. It was always difficult to tell with him. So Penelope took the bull by the horns, and grabbed a cookie from the plate. She pressed it into his hand, hoping he would forgive her later for the chocolate stains in his palm. Then she took that hand in hers, holding it tight.

“Hotch, you and I? As much as we want to fix everything, and think we can fix nearly everything, you know what the truth is?”

Now he smiled, bittersweetly.

“We can’t.”

“Nope. But we can work, and we can make cookies, and sometimes we can even prevent David Rossi from starting a fistfight with the Chief of the Houston Police Department. Although, that last one is mostly on you.”

Aha. Victory; Hotch started genuinely grinning at that one.

“Just so long as you guys are a little less conspicuous about the pool.”

He put his non-cookie hand on her shoulder, and patted it. She let him go, and he started for the door. He turned, before he left.

“Tell JJ, mission accomplished. And tell her...” He looked sad again, and couldn’t quite finish the sentence.

“I will, sir.”

And Penelope Garcia watched as Aaron Hotchner, AKA Hotch, AKA the Bakery Bandit, went back to his office. A little lighter of spirit then when he had left it.

Mission accomplished.

*fin*


End file.
